Lost Little Boys
by wildeisms
Summary: It takes a certain kind of man from a certain kind of life to join a team like the Dead Men. But before they were Dead Men, they were lost little boys just trying to find their way.
1. Shudder

Children are meant to be seen and not heard. That is what he had been told so many times by stern women with permanent frowns etched on their face. This went double for the children in their care (and the term is used loosely). They were the children no one wanted, why would they want to be heard? Shrink down, shut up, do as you're told. Though those exact words were never used, the mantra seemed to echo through the walls of the dingy building.

All things considered, they were not bad children. They studied obediently, ate and slept as they were told to, and for the most part maintained the solemn calm that their carers liked to see. But placing nearly forty young children in the same institution cannot run completely smoothly, no matter how much you threaten and beat and shout at those who break the rules. There were fights, and far too often they involved the boy who would grow up to be known as Anton Shudder.

"You, Child!" The tutors and matrons never bothered to learn the names of their charges. It just wasn't convenient or practical, and sometimes even one with a taken name would still remain as 'Child' or other such monikers. And for those who had no family that they knew of, this address was all the identity they had.

The boy who would later be known as Anton Shudder was one such child. He was a perspicacious young boy, and so while he did not know the name his parents had given him, he knew three fundamental things. Number one, he was not wanted anywhere. His parents would not have sent him to this place at the tender age of two had they wanted him, regardless of the supposed magical skill he was meant to gain from his time here. The staff didn't seem to want any of them (he had often wondered why they were here when they seemed to dislike children so much), and the other children, most of whom had arrived here after their sixth birthday, certainly didn't. This, he knew, was enough evidence to prove that particular fact. Number two, he would be here until his sixteenth birthday. While the children with families could be taken away at any time, those without were stuck until they were old enough to get proper work and be of use to people. And while in the dark solitude of his room, the boy who would later be known as Anton Shudder liked to drift into a dream world where people came for him and took him away to some mysterious better life. That was not going to happen and in the daylight he knew it, but night is the time of the heart, not the mind. And the boy who would later be known as Anton Shudder had such an ache in his heart. And finally, the third thing that he knew was that he was angry.

It was this anger that had caused the matron to shout. He lifted his head, dark hair falling into his blazing eyes. "Yes, Miss?" he said in a forced calm voice with a badly concealed steely edge. It was almost as if he were not currently on top of a young blonde girl with neat little plaits and a long skirt, having been punching her as hard as his seven year old fists were able to.

"What in God's name do you think you're doing? Get off of her this instant!"

Shooting her one last nasty look, he got off of the girl and stood before the formidable woman, awaiting his fate. Regardless of what had happened, it had been worth it. That girl had hit the poor little stray puppy that sometimes came down the lane, the puppy that he liked to think of as his. He was the one who cared for it most, anyway. Sometimes, he'd sneak scraps of dinner out for it to eat, even though a full meal in this place was nowhere near enough for a young child.

But none of that mattered. Whatever anyone did, you didn't hurt them. If you hurt them, you were wrong. That was how things worked here. You swallowed your anger, pushed it deep down inside, and never let it out. That was how to be a good child and avoid punishment. And he had failed. So the boy who would later be known as Anton Shudder stepped forward to meet his fate.

That was neither the first nor the last time he had been beaten and locked away in the dark and cold cellar, with its rats and soft noises that made sure you felt afraid all night of what could be hiding in there with you. But as he got older, he learnt to control his anger more and more until he was hardly ever in trouble. By age fifteen, the boy who had recently taken the name of Anton Shudder was only ever in trouble when he had fought to defend someone else. Once, he went hungry for four days because some stupid children were bullying a new girl, just six years old and already scared enough without their torment. The rest of the time, he was quiet and reserved, attentive in his lessons and lectures, and learnt to hide his emotions behind a mask of neutral calm.

But his time as a well-behaved child was short lived. On the day of his sixteenth birthday, he was forced to leave the only place he had ever known as home, and with not a hint that he possessed any kind of magic at all. With nowhere to go, he took to the streets in the knowledge that he may not even survive a single night. But who would mind if he did die? The person who had the inconvenience of cleaning up his corpse, most likely.

By some miracle, the night was kind. She let him live on, although her icy tendrils had trailed over his heart enough to leave him shivering and ill. He could scarcely move come morning, his large and yet far too thin to be healthy form was sore and shaky all day, his fear of what another night like this could do to him not helping matters. But it was not his life that was in danger that night.

It was the voice that pulled him from his sleep. A low voice, as rough and harsh as the ground Anton had been sleeping on. Pushing his hair back from his face to see better, Anton sat up to properly look at the men. There were three of them, all tall - although not as tall as him - and all rather menacing in appearance. The man in the centre carried a knife almost as long as his forearm, and all of them were gathered around a girl even younger than he was. She was a child, sleeping quietly on the street, and they wanted to hurt her. That anger boiled inside him, red hot and pulsing so hard he couldn't think, so much that he couldn't contain it. And now he was away from all those rules, he didn't have to.

For the first time in many years, Anton Shudder fully felt his anger. Real, unsuppressed anger.

Shaking, he got to his feet, feeling as though his chest was about to burst. He let it build and build and build inside him until-

The Gist tore open his chest and attacked. The three men, who had not even noticed the boy trembling with fury behind them, were whisked off their feet and thrown across the street like the rag dolls of a child having a particularly aggressive tantrum, with no finesse or care. The Gist was pure emotion with no real thoughts to reel it in. Just years of pent up rage. The noise of it woke the girl and she ran, her malnourished and abused body barely carrying her away fast enough.

When Anton Shudder came back to himself several minutes later, he was alone. The street was empty and broken, like a war zone. And in a way, he supposed it was. And it was all his fault. Had any innocent people been injured, caught in the crossfire of his fury? He didn't know and he wasn't sure he wanted to. Had it been magic? That seemed most likely. But what kind of hellish curse had bestowed this particular brand of magic upon him? That was a question he could not answer at such a young age. In time, he would learn to use it, but if you were to ask the adult Anton if he truly would have chosen his discipline, he would be afraid to give either answer.

Anger is a dangerous thing and, in the mind of Anton Shudder, as much of a weakness as it is a strength.


	2. Hopeless

The best way to hide is and has always been in plain sight. The boy who would grow up to be known by the single name of Hopeless learnt this from a very young age, as for his family and people like them, invisibility seemed to be synonymous with safety. If people were too aware of them, it was almost always a bad thing. They could be taken away or attacked or killed without a reason behind it and be completely certain that there would be no repercussions for the man who did it. Blend in, keep quiet, don't draw attention to yourself. Hide, always hide. Those phrases were repeated as mantras, seared onto his mind before he could even string together a sentence. So before any other skill, the boy who would later be known as Hopeless learnt to hide, and he did it well.

Few children pick their discipline consciously so early but by the age of six, he knew. And by eight, that discipline was completely mastered. The boy who would later be known as Hopeless could change his appearance at will. Although it shocked his family at first, they came around when it turned out to be extraordinarily useful. Having a different face every day opened up an awful lot of possibilities for him.

As would be expected, he started small. When your family is paid very little and, due to the sheer number of them, eats very much, a little thievery can be for the most part condoned. Within a few months, the boy who would later be known as Hopeless had developed such a skill in subtlety that in many cases, his victims did not even know for a long time that anything had been taken and even if he had not been able to change his face he would not have been apprehended. But doing so was safer, as who would suspect a little white boy? Within a few months, the family ate like they were rich without having spent a single bit of their wages on their meals. He had become their saviour.

But soon enough, the young boy found it took next to no concentration or effort to extract food from a seller's stall. It was easy. It was repetitive. It was boring. And of course, in his mind, pickpocketing was the next logical step. It was riskier, the chances of being caught immediately were so much higher, but that was exactly what he wanted. Soon they were not just eating like the rich, they were rich. And his family turned a blind eye to the source of their newfound wealth, simply grateful to live comfortably for the first time in innumerable generations.

So the boy who would later be known as Hopeless had no reason to stop. And as he grew older and learnt more of the harsh truths of the world around him, of the corruption and violence and lies that made up the very fabric of society, he became inventive. For it is so very easy to ruin or save a life when you can mimic the appearance of any other human perfectly and, with practice, their voice and mannerisms too. Give the boy enough time to observe beforehand and he could replace anyone completely with no one else being the wiser. The power of it all was intoxicating.

They always say that curiosity killed the cat. This omniscient 'they', whose identity seems to have been lost to time, would not have been at all surprised by the result of the boy's downfall. But the boy was not quite so wise and not quite so experienced. He was, after all, still a child, even with all that power.

The fractures within society were growing. Like cracks in glass, they were barely noticeable at this point in time, and only once the boy who would later be known as Hopeless had taken his name and found camaraderie in the other misfit fighters of the magical underworld would he see the ways in which it had all begun.

The Church of the Faceless had been becoming more and more extreme. Their views were frightening and their members even more so, but no one dared to voice their concerns. Those who did had the unpleasant habit of becoming very dead shortly after. And anyone who knew enough about what they were really doing to involve the Sanctuaries was either a member or in the category of very dead. But there was no one else like the boy who would later be known as Hopeless.

It was too easy, in the end. He had learned to observe, and so he did. He watched and waited until he recognised each member he had seen, and knew some well enough to mirror them completely. And that is what he did.

It is not an everyday occurrence to be attacked by your own doppelganger, so the man he chose - a man named Lethian Scelestic, who was rarely seen out of his midnight blue cloak - was far too stunned to do anything other than collapse after one, strong hit. That was another skill he had developed over the years, and one that would remain beneficial throughout his life. Beneficial to him, at any rate. Less so to Scelestic and the many others who would fall or break because of it.

Walking down the street as a member of the Church was an entirely different experience to any which he had previously encountered. He had already learnt that another's face would almost always improve his standing, but the face of Lethian Scelestic created something more. People let him pass without question, but did not simply let their eyes pass over him. They shrank back and watched him with fear in their eyes, looking away if he were to meet their frightened gaze. He commanded the streets with an unquestionable authority and a domineering stride. For a few moments, he forgot that he was looked down upon by the same people now cowering away from him.

One key fact, however, did not occur to him immediately. He, like every other outsider, had never been inside the Church of the Faceless which Scelestic was so familiar with. This really quite crucial piece of information only entered his mind once he had already entered the Church, and by then it was already too late.

"Greetings, Lethian," a tall, balding man in a robe like his own said with a nod.

"Greetings," the boy who would later be known as Hopeless replied, his voice a perfect imitation of Scelestic's low, rasping growl.

"You are very nearly late."

"But I am not."

"And yet you show such little concern. Do you think yourself special enough to keep even Phrontisterion waiting?"

"I could ask you the same question." He did hope he had the authority to do so, particularly as he did not know who either the balding man or this Phrontisterion person were. But thankfully, luck seemed to be on his side as the man looked offended, but did not say anything more on the subject.

"Then we shall keep her waiting no longer. Come, Lethian," he said, and swept away. The boy who would later be known as Hopeless had no choice but to follow. Perhaps, he thought, he would be able to pull this off better than he had ever expected with blind luck and remarkable acting alone.

He was wrong.

The balding man led him through a doorway that shimmered silver. The moment the boy who would later be known as Hopeless stepped through, an alarm blared that made his eyes widen in panic.

A beautiful woman stepped out of a room at the end of the corridor and with a flick of her wrist, the alarm silenced. She looked at him, and he could no longer move. Frozen in place, he could only stare and allow the dread to consume his insides like a terrible parasite, yet one which would surely not compare to what these people would do to him.

"You are not Lethian Scelestic," said the woman in a low, melodic voice which only pulled him deeper into the trance. "Show me your true self."

The idea of resisting did not even cross his mind. How could anyone disobey that voice, that beauty? He shrank back to his natural size, his skin turning darker and his hair growing longer. If he were to look back, he would know that all he would have needed to resist was a taken name and a little willpower, but he was a child. Just a child, in a situation that even an adult may have failed in.

"Is that his real face? Or are you trying to make us go easy on you, showing the face of a child? Balistarius, how can we know for sure?"

"It's hopeless, he's a shapeshifter," the balding man - Balistarius - sneered, and a smile spread across the boy's face. It did not need a moment's consideration, he knew from the moment that it had left Balistarius' mouth that he had been correct. The boy who from this moment on would be known as Hopeless took the name and drew up every ounce of strength to the surface of his being. Strength that the name afforded him, that allowed him to break free of the trance he had been placed under.

But he did not fight. He simply turned on his heels and ran, as fast as he was able to, thankful for the first time in his life for the time he had spent stealing and fleeing on the streets. He kept on running, as far away as he could get before finally collapsing on a desolate, muddy road. The only thing he knew for certain now was that he could never show his true face again.


End file.
